Joining Joyner

In the middle of W. North Street, right between The Alamo and Watterson Towers, we were introduced by a mutual friend during our first week at ISU. To be honest, neither one of us remember how we felt about each other during this first introduction, but this obviously wasn't our last interaction.

Not too long after meeting each other we connected through our devotion to The Impact Movement, membership at the same church, and serving as RAs in Tri Towers. We transitioned from general members at Impact meetings into spiritual leaders. Outside of Impact, we grew closer to our faith by attending City of Refuge Ministries throughout our entire undergrad career. As friends, we would meet each other in Milner Library for study sessions. These meetings eventually turned into breakfast in Watterson's dining center. We finally upgraded to Linkins Dining Center once we became RAs at two of the best residence halls on campus. It took us over two years to finally make our relationship "official", but we're so glad we did.

To this day we can't settle on if our relationship started on October 28th or 29th. It happened right after 11:59pm on the 28th, you be the judge :) Because our anniversary is close to Halloween we made it a tradition to "dress up" each year as a couple. (The first year we dressed as The Wades, the second year we dressed as The Obamas, and the third year we got lazy and wore matching God is Dope tees.) Throughout these four years we've witnessed each other graduate more than once, take on global mission trips, and adjust to new family and friend dynamics. We know we still have much more to witness.

Trying to maintain a relationship from what feels like the opposite ends of Illinois (Jaylon being from Decatur and Ashley being from Evanston), they were used to having part-time commitments in each other's hometowns. The day before Father's Day, Ashley and her younger brother shared a graduation celebration. Jaylon told Ashley that he would leave early to visit his dad in Decatur for the holiday. Little did Ashley know, this was just a decoy to distract her from what would really happen. Once Jaylon "left", Ashley was taken inside to be distracted by her cousin as Jaylon prepared to pop the big question. Under the impression that Jaylon was almost 200 miles away, Ashley had no idea what was waiting for her once she returned to her family outside. To share in the joy of what happened next follow the link below https://www.instagram.com/tv/By0LKhggAi8/